drum circle

My daughter likes to attend a drum circle that they have in a park near our home and I thought I'd like to try a drum circle with the littles.  I've been collecting various types of drums from garage sales and thrift stores but I still don't have enough for each of the children in my class -  so this week we made coffee can drums. We used colored masking tape and stickers to decorate them.  I found a DVD to introduce the concept of drum circles before we began.  It's called The Drum Along Drum Circle Video.

Goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo . . .

I have that Raffi song stuck in my head today.  Wonder why? :)

Today we drew zoo animals with Sharpie markers and colored them in with watercolor paints.  After they dried we cut them out and mounted them on styrofoam meat trays (thank you Publix!).  The littles were pretty pleased with how these turned out and I was amazed by how much attention they paid to detail.  I love this point in the year when you can see so much change.

Messy Monday

I love when things that seem so simple to adults and older children seem like magic to 3 and 4 year olds. Today we experimented with white paint.  Each child got one hand painted white and then got to choose  a color for the other hand.  When hands rubbed together the magic began - lovely pastel shades of pink and baby blue, lavender, and pale orange.  One of my littles is just learning to speak English.  He doesn't often hang out in the art area but today he smiled up at me and said, "Again!  Again!"  Ahhh - - - every Monday needs a little magic.

clowning around

We made paper plate clowns by painting faces, adding yarn hair, and cutting paper hats.  The balloon noses were a big hit with the littles - not so much with me.  I've developed an allergy to latex and my mouth didn't feel great after blowing up the balloons.  I guess when I was planning this I forgot that 3 and 4 year olds aren't really able to blow up their own balloons.  I got so caught up in thinking how much they'd enjoy the balloons that I forgot :)

circus tents

materials:  construction paper for the tent and roof, paint, bingo or dot paint markers, scissors for cutting the triangle roof and decorative scissors for the bottom of the roof

I've never explored a circus theme before this year but I'm glad I did!  The littles love learning about the circus and we are having a great time with dramatic play.  At the art table we tried balloon painting, painted clown faces on paper plates, and made these simple circus tents.  Thank you, Jen, for passing along the circus books!

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